CPS 2020 AND 2016/17 PLAN Our duty is to prosecute the right people for the right offences. The CPS works with our partners at the heart of the criminal justice system to protect the public and create a safe society.

We will be independent and fair and will deliver justice in every case, acting professionally and striving for excellence. We will treat people with respect and will be honest and open about our work. THE STORY SO FAR

SAVINGS AND EFFICIENCIES DELIVERED AFTER SIGNIFICANT CUTS

REDUCED EXPENDITURE £101 MILLION reduction in net annual expenditure since 2011/12

STEADY CONVICTIONS Conviction rate remains steady around 83%

DELIVERING JOINED UP JUSTICE ACROSS AREA BOUNDARIES

LOWER HEADCOUNT 27% fewer staff than in 2011/12

GUilty PLEAS 76% guilty pleas up from 69% in 2011/12

EFFICIENT OPERATING through digitisation, Better Case Management and Transforming Summary Justice

CROWN COURT CASES Caseload in Crown Court remains steady at 96,000 - 101,000 cases per annum

PROCEEDS OF CRIME £84 MILLION put back into public funds in 2015/16

MAGISTRATES CASES 36% reduction in magistrates court caseload

AN EVER CHANGING CASELOAD AS WE ADAPT TO AN EVOLVING CRIME ENVIRONMENT

SHIFTING CASELOAD 28% 5 year increase in sexual offence cases

STEADY CONVICTION RATE, RISING GUILTY PLEAS AND STREAMLINED CASELOADS BY BRINGING THE RIGHT CASES AND WORKING BETTER WITH OUR PARTNERS

SERIOUS AND COMPLEX 23% 5 year increase in fraud and forgery cases

AN EVER CHANGING CASELOAD AS WE ADAPT TO AN EVOLVING CRIME ENVIRONMENT

5 year increase in sexual offence cases

5 year increase in fraud and forgery cases DELIVERING JUSTICE

Our new strategic priorities reflect our commitment to being a flexible, trusted prosecution service. That commitment is underpinned by our existing values:

- Treat everyone with respect
- Be independent and fair
- Be honest and open
- Behave professionally and strive for excellence

OUR VALUES

SUCCESS OF OUR PEOPLE

We will attract the best people and be recognised for our investment in staff, training and skills

HIGH QUALITY CASEWORK

We will deliver justice through excellent, timely legal decision-making, casework preparation and presentation

PUBLIC CONFIDENCE

Our decisions will be open and transparent and the public will trust that we are fair and deliver justice

CONTINUOUSLY IMPROVING

We will continue to digitise and modernise the way we work and support a flexible workforce. We will deliver swifter justice, fewer hearings and more effective trials Our decisions will be open and transparent, and the public will trust that we are fair and deliver justice. We will:

- Positively influence the criminal justice landscape and deliver justice with our partners.

- Provide a professional service to everyone we work with.

- Treat victims and witnesses with respect and care, and respond to their individual needs.

- Be open, listen, explain our decisions and learn from our successes and our mistakes.

- Anticipate and adapt to new and emerging criminal trends.

- Work with and learn from communities to build confidence in the criminal justice system.

- Create engaging campaigns that explain our work.

- Develop effective policies and guidance that reflect changes in society.

- Deal promptly and thoroughly with enquiries and complaints. We will attract the best people and be recognised for our investment in staff, training and skills. We will:

- Behave according to our values, creating a culture of respect where it’s safe to speak up.

- Nurture and grow our talent, offering everyone a clear path for career development.

- Empower leaders to foster a culture of learning where everyone takes responsibility for their own development, and progression is based on merit.

- Broaden our expertise by supporting career moves in and out of the CPS, and between teams.

- Equip our people with the skills to excel in a changing environment.

- Support social mobility, and invest in apprenticeships, scholarships, legal and professional training.

- Set high expectations for individual performance, and be clear how this is managed.

- Develop a diverse workforce that reflects the society we serve. We will deliver justice through excellent, timely legal decision-making, casework preparation and presentation. We will:

- Give early advice to investigators so that the right cases progress, or are quickly stopped.

- Take the right decisions, treating every case fairly and equally, and bringing the correct charges according to the evidence and the Code for Crown Prosecutors.

- Deliver swifter justice through timely case preparation, encouraging appropriate early guilty pleas.

- Build and progress strong cases.

- Provide first class advocacy in every case.

- Build effective partnerships, nationally and internationally, to ensure excellence across the criminal justice system and to prevent harm to the UK. We will continue to digitise and modernise the way we work, supporting a flexible workforce and delivering swifter justice, fewer hearings and more effective trials. We will:

- Look forward, identifying opportunities to reform and improve.

- Work flexibly across geographic boundaries to drive up quality across the CPS.

- Rapidly redeploy resources to respond to changing crime patterns.

- Co-create a shared, digital system that works for all partners in the criminal justice system.

- Design new ways of working informed by the expertise of our frontline staff.

- Invest in our IT, giving people the tools they need to do their best, wherever they work.

- Adapt business processes that support efficiency and cut bureaucracy. THE PUBLIC HAS CONFIDENCE THAT THE CPS IS FAIR, EFFECTIVE AND INDEPENDENT

WE WILL:

• Treat victims and witnesses with respect and care and respond to their individual needs.

• Enhance our complaints performance management systems to ensure they are dealt with promptly and thoroughly.

• Identify and share best practice in domestic abuse prosecutions, including the new offence of controlling or coercive behaviour.

• Develop capability of Witness Care Units to meet the planned Victim’s Law and related reforms.

• Improve the instance, quality and timeliness of letters issued to victims explaining our decision to stop a case or substantially alter charges.

• Develop effective policies and guidance that reflect changes in society, such as delivering against the cross-government hate crime strategy.

• Ensure that all RASSO cases are reviewed and presented in court by a specialist trained sexual offences prosecutor.

• Create an engagement plan and resource hub of materials for schools, colleges and universities.

• Develop more proactive campaigns like #ConsentIs.

• Conduct stakeholder mapping to identify how best to measure confidence.

MEASURED BY:

- LESS THAN 25% unsuccessful outcomes due to witness issues
- MORE THAN 55% of hate crime sentence uplifts recorded in finalised convictions
- LESS THAN 16% of complaints escalated to stages 2 & 3 before resolution
- FEWER THAN 250 RASSO\* cases waiting more than 28 days for pre-charge advice or decision

\*Rape and serious sexual offences WE SUPPORT THE SUCCESS OF OUR PEOPLE

WE WILL:

• Nurture and grow our talent, offering everyone a clear path for career development.

• Broaden our expertise by supporting career moves in and out of the organisation.

• Support social mobility by investing in apprenticeships, scholarships, legal and professional training.

• Increase workforce flexibility and resilience by moving more work to where our people are located.

• Improve the experience of working at the CPS through a continued focus on employee engagement and wellbeing.

• Invest in the skills of our workforce and ensure effective evaluation of learning and development.

• Set high expectations for individual performance and be clear how this is managed.

MEASURED BY:

MORE THAN 55% employee engagement index from People Survey

MORE THAN 2.3% apprenticeships to meet Civil Service ambition for social mobility

MORE THAN 250 internal and external secondments supporting workforce mobility

WITHIN 4% vacancies against the resource plan

MORE THAN 33% increase in full-time equivalent people managing out-of-Area cases supporting resource flexibility EVERYONE IN THE CPS CONTRIBUTES TO HIGH QUALITY CASEWORK

WE WILL:

• Give early advice to investigators so that the right cases progress and others are quickly stopped.

• Take the right decisions, treating every case fairly and equally, and bringing the correct charges according to the evidence and the Code for Crown Prosecutors.

• Deliver swifter justice through timely case preparation that builds and progresses strong cases and encouraging appropriate early guilty pleas.

• Build effective partnerships, nationally and internationally, to ensure excellence across the Criminal Justice System (CJS) and maximise the recovery of proceeds of crime.

• Develop a new advocacy strategy to ensure our advocates are able to meet changing demands and that we provide first class advocacy in every case.

• Embed ‘Better Case Management’ to ensure fewer hearings in Crown Court cases and improved engagement from all parties.

• Utilise the trends from Individual Quality Assessments to help better identify themes and inform how we can improve.

MEASURED BY:

- Compliance with judicial orders in the Crown Court
- Cracked or ineffective trial rate due to prosecution reasons in Crown Court
- Recovered from proceeds of crime
- Cracked or ineffective trial rate due to prosecution reasons in magistrates’ courts
- Hearings on average per guilty plea case in magistrates’ courts WE WILL CONTINUOUSLY IMPROVE THE WAY WE WORK

WE WILL:

• Develop capability to respond to and meet challenges of HMCTS Court Reform programme.

• Invest in technology, giving people the tools they need to do their best, wherever they work.

• Explore alternative ways to deliver a better integrated charging service to police and other investigators.

• The CJS Common Platform will have deployed its first applications to test cross-agency digital justice.

• Develop an IT strategy to complement and support multi-agency initiatives.

• Co-create a shared, digital system that works for all partners in the CJS.

• Design new ways of working informed by the expertise of our own people and develop new ways to support this, such as People Impact Assessments and satisfaction surveys.

• Employ tight financial management that ensures we make full and best use of available funding.

MEASURED BY:

MORE THAN 95.5% availability of core business infrastructure through resilient IT

MORE THAN 4500 remote access service users supported by smarter working

MORE THAN 5% OF £3.3M reduced cost of paper purchased and couriers used through digital working

WITHIN 1% of agreed operating funding limits About the Crown Prosecution Service

The CPS is responsible for prosecuting most cases heard in the criminal courts in England and Wales. It is led by the Director of Public Prosecutions and acts independently on criminal cases investigated by the police and other agencies. The CPS is responsible for deciding the appropriate charge in more serious or complex cases and provides information, assistance and support to victims and witnesses.